‘What Kind of War is This?’

This article explores the nature of the American war in Vietnam in an effort to determine whether it was a response to an indigenous uprising or an external effort by the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) to use a wide array of policies and programs to unite North Vietnam and South Vietnam under the party’s leadership. It argues that, although there initially were elements of the South Vietnamese population that rose against the southern leadership, the CPV gained control of their resistance and relegated it to a secondary role in the CPV war effort.     

What is the global landpower network and what value might it provide?

US national security guidance, as well as the US Army’s operational experiences since 2001, emphasizes the importance of working closely with partner countries to achieve US strategic objectives. The US Army has introduced the global landpower network (GLN) concept as a means to integrate, sustain and advance the Army’s considerable ongoing efforts to meet US national security guidance. This study develops the GLN concept further, and addresses three questions. What benefits can the GLN provide the Army? What are the essential components of the GLN? What options exist for implementing the GLN concept? By developing the GLN concept, the Army has the opportunity to transition the GLN from an often ad hoc and reactive set of relationships to one that the Army more self-consciously prioritizes and leverages as a resource to meet US strategic objectives.     

Better is the Neighbor?

Abstract

This study applies the Sequential Panel Selection Method (SPSM), to investigate the convergence properties of the military expenditure of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) during the period of 1990–2015. Compared to the traditional methods, SPSM considers fundamentally general spatial homogeneous and heterogeneous relationships with countries and examines the evolution of military expenditure. We find that four-fifths of NATO member countries have been convergent with the UK, but no country’s military expenditure is convergent with the US. This means that there is no significant linkage effect in the US for NATO military expenditure. While they are allies of the US, the majority of NATO member countries’ military expenditures are consistent with UK military expenditure. The main reasons are due to the geographical space layout and the international relationship convergence. The results indicate that more than four-fifths of NATO member countries have been coordinated with convergence theory and spillover effect.     

“What is dear to you?” Survey of beliefs regarding protection of critical infrastructure against terrorism

Up to the present, there is only very little research on how the population perceives terrorism and its threats, even though support from the population is crucial for effective counterterrorism. By eliciting beliefs and subjecting them to content analyses, six factors were found that determine the protection worthiness of a target in the people's view: the potential damage to “people,” “symbolism,” “economy,” “politics,” “nature,” and “image/publicity.” These empirically found factors are in line with factors specified by terrorist target selection models. They differ in the strength of their cognitive representation among participants and, thus, their subjective importance to the people. The first three factors are shared among all participants, whereas the latter ones could only be found in a part of the participant sample. People's judgments of the targets' protection worthiness differ substantially from their judgments of the targets' attractiveness to terrorists, even though the same factors seem to be involved. This study offers an insight into the people's mental model about protection worthiness of targets. Together with classical risk analysis and knowledge about terrorists, these results can form a basis for setting up a holistic scheme for critical infrastructure protection.     

What Happened to Israeli Military Thought?

Abstract

This article addresses the following question: how can one explain the neglect of the intellectual aspects of the profession on the part of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF)? The explanations offered for that neglect are a mixture of cultural and societal factors. The cultural explanation focuses on Israeli strategic culture; the traditional Israeli perception of the combination of rich experience and experience-based intuition as a winning ticket; the tendency to extol improvisation; a cult of material strength; and a strong belief in technology. The social explanation stresses the declining attractiveness of a military career for qualitative young Israelis. The article contends that change can take place only if the IDF undergoes a process of institutional intellectualism – if not willingly then one imposed by the political echelon.     

When is greedy module assembly optimal?

Many coherent systems are configurations of identically structured modules, each consisting of a number of different components. The objective is to assemble the modules out of a collection of available components, and to install the modules in the system in a way that maximizes reliability. The greedy assembly rule builds one module out of the best available components, another out of the best remaining components, and so on. This article shows that greedy assembly is optimal whenever the modules have a series structure, no matter what the structure of the system in which the modules will be used might be, provided that the modules, once assembled, are installed in the system in an optimal way. The article also demonstrates that series modules are unique in this regard.     

What made American Civil War soldiers fight?

James M. McPherson, For Cause and Comrades: Why Men Fought in the Civil War. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. Pp.xv + 237, appendix, notes, index. £20 (cloth); $13.95 (paper). ISBN 0–10–512499–5     

How durable is the nuclear weapons taboo?

The nuclear weapons taboo is considered one of the strongest norms in international politics. A prohibition against using nuclear weapons has seemingly shaped state behavior for nearly seven decades and, according to some observers, made nuclear use ‘unthinkable’ today or in the future. Although scholars have shown that nuclear aversion has affected decision-making behavior, important questions about the nuclear taboo remain unanswered. This article seeks to answer a basic question: How durable is the taboo? We develop different predictions about norm durability depending on whether the taboo is based primarily on moral logic or strategic logic. We use the comparable case of the norm against strategic bombing in the 20th century to evaluate these hypotheses. The logic and evidence presented in this paper suggest that the norm of nuclear non-use is much more fragile than most analysts understand.     

United States Security Policy in the Western Hemisphere: Why Columbia,Why Now,and What is to be Done?

An evaluation of US policy toward Latin America and Columbia and its implications for the military begins with an understanding of the purposes and patterns of intervention over the years. An evaluation of contemporary security policy in the Western Hemisphere also hinges on an understanding of the broadening view of US national security. In developing these themes, this article (1) analyzes the major tenets of US policy toward Latin America, and the criteria for intervention; (2) examines the concepts of security; (3) explains and clarifies 'Why Columbia, why now, and what is to be done?'; (4) outlines some strategic and high operational-level imperatives for US civil-military involvement in Columbia; (5) puts forward seven additional strategic and operational imperatives for playing in the contemporary security area; (6) addresses the strategic adaption of US military power in the Columbian threat situation; and (7) provides some final conclusions and recommendations. Such an exercise, will, hopefully, stimulate North American, Columbian, and Latin American thinking and action regarding a set of complicated problems that - whether one likes it or not, or is prepared to deal with it or not - is likely to be with us for some time beyond the year 2001.     

‘What is in a Name?’: The Role of (Different) Identities in the Multiple Proxy Wars in Syria

Abstract

Post-uprisings Middle East politics is frequently described as a ‘regional cold war’ involving proxy warfare that emphasises the role of shared identities linking external and local actors. But does the ‘content’ of identities impact proxy war dynamics? This article considers the present ‘battle for Syria’, a local conflict that became a theatre for multiple proxy wars involving actors emphasising identities on various levels, most notably national, religious/ sect and ethnic. It suggests that identity content does matter, with global powers more reluctant than regional players to back groups identifying at sub-national level, while foreign non-state actors are enthusiastic backers of sub-national identity.